Social media marketers are always in search of more ROI and less wasted time.

But, managing multiple accounts and building a community involves repetitive, time-consuming tasks. 

That’s where today’s suite of social media scheduling tools can save the day.

Social media scheduling tools are more than just a convenient shortcut to queue up posts. The right tools help your overall social media management process, improving your efficiency so you have more time to push out great content and develop connections with your followers in real time.

In this guide, you’ll discover social media scheduling tools that save teams time and help get results for their marketing efforts.

What is a social media scheduling tool?

A social media scheduling tool is a software or tool that helps you schedule your social posts across multiple social media accounts and platforms. Just because social media is an “always on,” it doesn’t mean you have to be.

Scheduling your social posts ahead of time gives you and your social team the opportunity to plan ahead and stay focused with other tasks.

These 16 social media scheduling tools can boost your marketing workflow

  1. Sprout Social
  2. CoSchedule
  3. Feedly
  4. Airtable
  5. Tweetdeck
  6. Planable
  7. Sked Social
  8. Post Planner
  9. StatusBrew
  10. MeetEdgar
  11. eClincher
  12. NapoleonCat
  13. Sendible
  14. SocialBee
  15. Zoho Social
  16. Iconosquare

1. Sprout Social

Sprout Social is your best bet if you're looking for a social media scheduling tool that does it all. 

Sprout customers - from small businesses to enterprise companies to agencies - rave about the ability to effortlessly plan, organize and deliver content and campaigns across social networks.

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For starters, jumping back and forth between networks is a huge time-sink. Consider how the bulk of brands out there are publishing content to multiple social platforms. With Sprout, you can publish your latest Facebook post, Instagram photo or Tweet simultaneously.

social media scheduling tools such as Sprout keep you from juggling between social sites

In addition to its industry-leading scheduling tools, interactive calendar and asset management library, Sprout also simplifies collaboration. User-level permissions provide specific access to marketing managers, writers and everyone in between to contribute to your publishing strategy.

And once your content is scheduled and published, Sprout makes it easy to measure success and refine your game plan going forward.

Sprout Social Calendar

 

You can easily apply custom tags to messages to better organize and report, then use Sprout’s easy-to-use social media analytics to evaluate impressions, engagement, follower growth and much more.

From analyzing hashtags to identifying top-performing content, Sprout represents the ultimate optimization tool for brands looking to fine-tune their social presence in addition to scheduling content. You can even count on Sprout for social ad reporting to boost ROI from the paid content you’re scheduling.

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While Sprout gives you ultimate control to plan your publishing strategy as you see fit, it also makes it easy to automate the process to maximize results.

Sprout’s patented ViralPost® technology helps you hone in on the optimal posting times for your audience, replacing guesswork with guaranteed engagement.

2. CoSchedule

CoSchedule emphasizes efficiency for marketing teams and individuals alike. Integrating with company blogs via WordPress, the platform allows brands to publish and push content to social media simultaneously.

CoSchedule allows bloggers and social managers to collaborate on campaigns

Additionally, CoSchedule provides a comprehensive "Top Content Report" which documents social shares and engagement. This is a fantastic feature for content creators looking to figure out which pieces are resonating most with readers. You can also attach items from Google Drive, your computer library and Coschedule’s headline studio.

CoSchedule's top content report lets you know what pieces of content are crushing it

Unlike other social media scheduling tools, CoSchedule primarily focuses on content versus solely social performance. Features such as the "ReQueue" Bucket allow teams to recycle and schedule their best messages automatically without having to lift a finger. This results in more fresh content in your brand's feed faster.

Coschedule's requeue feature lets brands recycle their best content for social

3. Feedly

Feedly is a scheduling tool with an emphasis on content curation. 

Knowing what to post is a major challenge several brands face when it comes to growing their online presence.

Digging for fresh pieces of content can be both time-consuming and tiring. Meanwhile, you don't want to solely post your own stuff over and over, right?

That's where Feedly comes in.

how to bring in content feeds to Feedly

Feedly's platform automatically curates content to fill up your social media calendar. Instead of scrambling for news or relevant pieces to publish to your audience in-between your own scheduled social media posts, Feedly does the legwork for you.

Again, managing your social feeds shouldn't eat up all of your free time. Tools like Feedly take the pressure off of marketers to constantly save and bookmark content for future sharing.

Oh, and Feedly integrates instantly with Sprout Social. Nice, right?

4. Airtable

Airtable brings the processes of content planning and social media scheduling together. The platform can be used among teams or individuals to not only plan out future pieces of content but how those posts will be promoted across various social sites.

If you can't tell by now, social media scheduling and content creation go hand in hand.

Every time you sit down to knock out a blog post, you probably already have your audience in the back of your mind.

You want to craft pieces that have potential to get shared around like crazy. You want to get as much mileage as you can via social sharing so that piece of content is seen by as many people as possible.

That means planning out your content, plain and simple.

Airtable provides a simple view of your social schedule

Another nice bonus of Airtable is its asset manager. This feature affords users a sense of consistency across your campaigns and ads prior to hitting "publish."

Airtable allows users to keep track of their social media assets

In short, Airtable allows you to stay one step ahead by assessing what your social media posts will look like before your content even goes live. Never hurts to be prepared, does it?

5. Tweetdeck

Tweetdeck is a free social media scheduling tool that’s focused on Twitter. Its simplified interface allows you to engage across multiple Twitter accounts.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Tweetdeck

Integrating with Twitter in an instant, Tweetdeck represents a straightforward scheduling tool that allows you to queue tweets across multiple accounts.

Set up your Tweet, pick a time and watch it go live. Nothing fancy, but effective nonetheless.

Despite its simplicity, Tweetdeck also boasts a comprehensive Twitter dashboard for users. You can see your live feed in addition to notifications, mentions and other activity all in one place.

You can save tweets for future posting. Also, Tweetdeck gives you an instant view of all your pages with options to re-order or customize your view.

Tweetdeck represents a totally free upgrade to your Twitter account. Even if you use another tool for scheduling Twitter posts, you might consider toying around with the platform just for fun.

6. Planable

Planable boasts many features typical of today's' social media scheduling tools with an emphasis on teamwork and collaboration.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Planable

Most notable is Planable's commenting and approval system for scheduled social media posts. Team members are able to go back and forth with comments to fine-tune scheduled content before it goes live. Users can then approve the posts internally or wait for client approval if working as part of an agency team.

Roles and permissions allow different departments to collaborate so that everyone is on the same page. This leads to fewer bottlenecks and greater transparency as a post moves from Point A to Point B.

Planable also has labels for organizing content and an AI tool for brainstorming social media content ideas.

7. Sked Social

Sked Social is an Instagram-first scheduling tool, but also allows you to schedule posts to other social networks.

Sked Social's content queue allows users to prep photos, captions and hashtags for repeated use. The platform provides a real-time, drag-and-drop preview of your Instagram posts before they go live. This allows for quick and easy changes if you're not happy with your feed's aesthetics.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Sked Social

Built-in post templates and a variety of photo editing filters are nice creative touches to help your posts pop, too. The platform itself is highly intuitive for those working with visual content on Instagram.

Sked Social's templates make it easier to pick hashtags and come up with Instagram captions

8. Post Planner

Post Planner assists with the process of content creation, in addition to scheduling posts. Again, you can't just blast your own content over and over if you want to grow your following.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Post Planner

You can find content ideas for what to post and schedule it right inside Post Planner. This can be from sources like Reddit subreddits, streams, RSS feeds and content suggestions.

Post Planner can find relevant social content based on keywords and hashtags

Post Planner curates star-rated content based on engagement ratings when you search for a profile or keyword. This scheduler chooses the best times to post based on your audience's insights.

Post Planner allows users to toggle between planned posts and published content

9. StatusBrew

StatusBrew offers an extensive dashboard for teams to schedule content on social media. You can group profiles and users, set up approval workflows and tag posts. This scheduling tool has features to track campaigns, competitor accounts and content engagement.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, StatusBrew

10. MeetEdgar

MeetEdgar is a scheduling tool that works for more than social content. It works for blog posts too. This tool itself is Edgar. But, its web page is the introductory floor where you meet Edgar. You can A/B test your post to see what appeals to your audience.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Meet Edgar

11. eClincher

eCclincher is a social media scheduling tool that works well with multiple channels and auto-publishes blog posts. It suggests related content that you can schedule. You can attend to all messages, comments and mentions in one place. Also, you have access to an image library with millions of free photos and editing features.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, eClincher

12. NapoleonCat

NapoleonCat is a social media scheduling tool that allows teams to categorize and label content. It has a post preview feature to see what your posts will look like after they’re published. This scheduling tool has a simple interface. It offers role-based permissions to team members, and an option to keep tabs on competitors.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, NapoleanCat

13. Sendible

With Sendible, you can schedule posts to not only social media channels, but WordPress, Tumblr and Medium blogs. You can also find ideas for what to post through RSS feeds, and content and trends suggestions.

Sendible allows users to schedule content in bulk and customize on-brand images. Also, teams can improve their social strategy through automated reports.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Sendible

14. SocialBee

SocialBee is a scheduling tool with a seamless user interface.

The tool has a category feature that allows you to group content based on their usage. You can add different variations of a particular post to see the best-performing—A/B testing. Also, you can create reports to discover ways to improve your strategy.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, SocialBee

15. Zoho Social

Zoho Social is another social media scheduling tool that helps businesses build their online presence. With this scheduling tool, you can create and schedule posts, monitor relevant hashtags, and manage your leads all in one place. It also suggests the best times to publish your posts.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Zoho Social.

16. Iconosquare

With Iconosquare, teams can save time on content planning and scheduling for social media platforms.

This tool has a simple interface, and analytics and reporting features. It allows you to track relevant hashtags and mentions of your brand. You can stay up-to-date on industry benchmarks and what competitor brands are doing.

Dashboard of the social media scheduling tool, Iconosquare

What should you look for in a social media scheduling tool?

Only you know what your organization needs.

You need to consider certain factors to ensure you choose the best scheduling tool for your brand’s social growth.

Here are three things to consider:

Brand and team needs

Before you choose your social media scheduling tool, first evaluate your marketing tasks, brand goals, and team size.

Use this software RFP to identify your specific needs, and make the right investment choice.

Ease of use

A seamless user experience should be one of your core determining factors. Your social media scheduling process should save your team time, not give you headaches.

Ensure that your social scheduler has an easy-to-navigate dashboard and simple walkthrough guides.

Quality support

It’s the best experience when your social media scheduling tool offers great customer support. So, when making a choice, select one that has a track record of good attendance to customers.

How are you taking advantage of social media scheduling tools?

Brands of all shapes and sizes are using social media scheduling tools to grow their followings, save time and push out more content.

And given the fast-paced nature of the web at large, having these tools on deck is crucial for keeping your business’ content from getting lost in the shuffle.

Want to build your online presence with a scheduling tool that works? Try Sprout Social FREE for 30 days.